With development of network technologies, more and more applications can be executed through a network. For example, a device can be controlled and managed through a network so that an operator of the device can control and manage the device without visiting the site, which quickens the processing.
The following is a method for controlling devices through a network in the prior art:
Devices controllable by a client are preset for the client, and the client are preset correspondingly. The settings for the client include specifying the devices controllable by the client; and the settings for the device include specifying the clients capable of controlling the device. After the client and the devices are preset, the user may send a remote device control request to a server through the client (or browser) according to the settings. The remote device control request may specify remote devices that need to be controlled, or provide only query conditions with which the server can searches out the corresponding remote devices. The client may communicate with the server through a standard protocol.
After receiving the remote device control request from the client, the server determines which remote device that needs to be controlled on the client side; searches a maintained database for protocol mapping rules of the remote device, the server then obtains a private protocol of the remote device according to the control instruction in the standard protocol, and forwards the control request to the remote device.
The remote device returns the corresponding result to the server through the private protocol, and the server returns the result to the client through the standard protocol.
In the process of researching the prior art, the inventor finds that: through the existing method mentioned above, the client can control some devices remotely through a server, but the client and the devices need to be set before the control is exercised. Therefore, a client is only capable of controlling the devices which are set as allowing control, and a device can only be controlled by the clients which are set as being capable of controlling the device. That is, the capabilities of a device can only be invoked by the set clients, and other clients that are not set are incapable of invoking the capabilities of the device, and as a result, the device resources in the system cannot be made full use of.